News & ideas

Welcome back to the only NFL picks here on Associated Content that have gone flawless both in playoff games and political predictions. This is Zac’s Backs.
The Kid started off strong last week, going 4-0 during Wild Card weekend. Truth be told, there was some ugly football played last week. Not one of the four teams that advanced looked like championship material. The playoffs can be unpredictable, though, and you can never be 100 percent sure about anything. With that said, here are my picks for the Divisional Playoff games.

Seattle at Green Bay

We all watched as Seattle held firm control over Washington for about three quarters of football before taking a five-minute nap, during which the Redskins attempted to make things interested. Washington finally fell apart as almost everybody expected and the Seahawks coasted into this match-up against the Packers. For this game to have been made more interesting, Seattle needed to show something in their Wild Card game at home. What they showed is the same inconsistency that has been prevalent throughout this entire season.

This game isn’t so much about Brett Favre and his legacy as it is about Seattle’s inability to play as a good team for any real length of time. On paper I think these two teams actually match-up pretty well. Unfortunately for Seattle, football games are still played on the field and the Seahawks can’t beat the Packers in Green Bay.

Winner: Green Bay

Jacksonville at New England

Jacksonville was supposed to use their game against the Steelers as a stepping stone of sorts towards New England. Last week should have been the game where the Jags proved that they could compete with the Pats. Instead, Jacksonville allowed a less-than-good Steelers team to comeback before finally squeaking out a victory.

That type of play just isn’t going to cut it against an undefeated football team. I don’t expect the Patriots to have much trouble with Jacksonville in this contest.

Winner: New England

San Diego at Indianapolis

San Diego is another team that was supposed to impress during Wild Card weekend. Granted, the game against Tennessee was never really in doubt (at least in my eyes). Still, the Chargers looked far from “super” during their home playoff game. They’ll have to play much better in Indy.

Meanwhile, the Colts have been the most disrespected team the NFL has seen for quite sometime. The defending Super Bowl champs have been overshadowed by the Patriots since week one and I believe that they have enjoyed every minute of it. A home game for Peyton Manning with the added perk that there is little pressure on his and his team should equal a double-digit victory this weekend.

Winner: Tennessee

New York football Giants at Dallas Cowboys

Get that monkey off of your back, Eli! Manning looked pretty darn good during his first career playoff victory as the Giants offense executed a game plan that was close to flawless for most of the contest. Flawless is what they’re going to have to be at Dallas. Will I go with my heart once again this week?

You betcha.

If the Giants are ever going to have a real chance of defeating the Cowboys this season, the time is now. The Cowboys are beat up and doubting themselves after closing out the season with less-than-stellar play. Meanwhile, the Giants are playing their best football of this season and appear to be growing in confidence. Call me a homer all you want, but I’ll be the only person to say it.

Winner: New York football Giants

That’s all for me. As always you’ve been fantastic. Enjoy the primaries.

For my next post, this will be far from sports but more on gears you need to invest in. It’s entitled “The Things You Need to Buy From Amazon.” It includes backpacks, tumblers, gadgets, and event amazon tactical flashlight.

A growing number of backpackers have become aware of lightweight gear. People are starting to look at ultra light backpacking as appealing especially when weather conditions are favorable. The lightweight backpacking movement now evolves around 5 different systems: sleep, shelter, clothing, packing, cooking systems from thepnw.co.
Sleepers
During summer or moderate weather conditions, the sleeper is a light weight foam pad. During winter or cooler weather, the sleeper of choice can be an inflatable sleeping pad. This adds additional comfort and protection from a frigid ground.

Cooking system
For short (weekend hikes) some prefer a small alcohol stoves because it’s so lightweight and simple to operate. Others prefer the heavier canister stoves for the better (compressed) fuel system,

Shelter
The foremost change in the movement toward lightweight backpacking is in terms of shelter. More and more trekkers seem to be open to tarps over tents. A tarp typically shaves off 2-4 pounds of weigh. Tents themselves lighter and more functional. Minimalist hikers just deal with a poncho tarp which can serve as both rain gear and shelter especially during summer. Winter sheltering is more likely to be a heavier, though small, pyramid tent-type shelter.

Clothing
Clothing is now soft shell for winters. For summers, consider the use of a poncho or a waterproof jacket, 8-oz down or synthetic pull-over shirt with pants. And in the heat of the day, wear a moisture wicking material. Just do not wear cotton-it just soaks in all the sweat.

Depending on your destination, foot gear can range from an all-terrain tennis-type shoe to leather hiking boots. Regardless of your shoe selection, make sure that it’s well worn or broken-in. Avoid new shoes, they can be killer on your feet and cause blisters. And that could ruin your whole trip.

Backpack
Ultra light packs have no pockets no, frames, and now require hikers to have a new mindset. The backpack itself can be hi-tech canvas or sturdy-duty water-proof material. With heavier gear, you’ll just tire out.

So, too, the items that are inside have now changed considerably. Check specifics on necessities to carry online prior to venturing out. For example, instead of lugging a lot of water containers, make more extensive use of water purifiers and tablets (or purchase bottled water onsite where available). And if you’re really going to hike, forget the travel or guide books-they add a lot of unnecessary weight. But it’s okay to take pad and pen to take notes. You may just get the urge to jot down inspirational thought or a noteworthy observation. Do throw in duct tape–no don’t carry a roll, just wrap some around a pen or pencil.

And just as in taking any trip away from home, put the things you are going to need most on top. It can be really tough trying to dig into your bag to a much needed change of clothing.

One last tip before you head off to delve into lightweight backpacking, check out online forums. It’s more important to first network among experienced hikers than to go on a shopping spree. You don’t want to end up buying items you may not need. Happy trekking!

Choose a free website service. There’s lots of obtainable, and they usually have similar characteristics. Most are designed to be simple for beginners to make use of. When setting out to build a professional net site free, try to choose a service that won’t place an advertisement or logo on your pages. In addition, think about the kinds of templates (page designs) obtainable.

Step 2:

Sign up for an account. The most important consideration here is selecting your username. often the URL of your free net site will include your username. In order to build a successful professional website, it is vital to have a URL that is memorable, or at the least professional sounding. Skip your usual online tag and go for the name of your business, or possibly your actual name.

Step 3:

Choose a template. Most free website services have a variety of predesigned page styles to choose from. When you build a professional website, your best bet is to go for a simple, neat template. Keep in mind that it is simplest for most people to read black text on a light background.

Step 4:

Generate a page featuring the basic facts about your business. It doesn’t must be long, in fact, short and to-the-point informative pages may be most appealing to customers. Hire experts on web hosting but first you need to read web hosting Canada reviews.

Step 5:

Add images. This is not strictly necessary, but online page with any type of mixed media is usually much more successful.

Step 6:

Add other pages to the main page if necessary. Try to stick to subject per page. For example, a restaurant might add a page with a sample menu. Usually your website creation service will let you do this basically.

Step 7:

Check and double-check all the content on your website by going to your actual URL. When you have gone to the trouble of building a professional website, it is worth the additional hard work and time to eliminate any typos, grammatical errors or technical issues.

With Spring being all the buzz and Spring cleaning being on the top of everyone’s list, don’t you think a little revamping is in order? I love opening windows and playing around with a room for a whole day. It’s quite rewarding to get a whole new look and feel on the cheap! Here are some tips to get you started.
1.) Empty the room of everything small, and if you can handle it, the furniture too.

Cleaning out a room completely will give you an instant new perspective as what the room could be. When filled with your things, it’s hard to see the potential it’s hiding. It’s also a good chance to scope out if you really love your wall color, fan selection, and window dressing. When you bring the stuff back in your room, play with new layouts. Make sure not to block windows, and the sun really does something special to a room.

2.) Take home paint samples, and play with them!

We all know paint is the cheapest way to transform any room (furniture, floors, wooden dinnerware, and fireplaces for that matter!). I don’t know about you but I get excited when I am at the hardware store in the paint section. I am little a little kid collecting shiny new jewels every time I pass by the paint samples, and it’s served me well. It’s always good to have the samples on hand, but it’s even better when you can envision them up on your wall. It’s free. It’s fun. And it will motivate you to change things up!

3.) Make some art

We are FAR from artists in this house. I am not going to lie, I am a fine arts major switched to marketing because I had a professor tell me I was so bad at it. Dreadful, I know. So then, how do I make “art”? Easy! I don’t need to be Picasso to make something pretty I love. We are big on shadow boxes, found object art, doily lamps, and photography in this house.

4.) Let the light in
Ohhhh. My fave. Sunshine all the time! Can you tell I’m a Florida girl? A sun-filled room is a glorious room as far as I am concerned. If you have small windows or big windows, it doesn’t matter – let the light in.

5.) Go shopping in your other rooms
I love to shop. And I even have fun shopping in my own home. One thing I like to do is pull a bunch of stuff from a variety of rooms that hold a common feel or theme and use those things to decorate a whole room. It cuts the clutter down, and gives new life to already loved objects.

Pretty easy, right? We really do love “shopping” from our other rooms. It’s probably our favorite thing to do when we don’t feel like spending cash. For more home improvement tips and how to’s, come say “hi!” at joeyandlana.com!

Fort Green Council, Inc. on Fulton Street may be known for being a senior center, but it also provides valuable low cost and free childcare for the community.
The Universal pre-kindergarten program offers free to low cost childcare for children between the ages of 2 to 4 years old. The day care center serves three meals and a snack according to the Fort Green Council website. An after school program, Out of School Time Program (OST), is available for children in first to sixth grade at Teddy Kids Kinderdagverblijf.

Parents have to contact the day care center and find out how to apply. A list of the day care centers can be found here. Each center has licensed teachers and is funded by the NYC Administration for Children’s Services.

This not-for-profit organization is funded by the NYC Department for the Aging and also provides home delivered meals for seniors. Another well known program provided by the Fort Green Council, Inc. is Jazz 966, a Friday night Jazz and Blues concerts for the community.

With a million products that promise to erase bags under the eyes or zap a zit, the average medicine cabinet can get a little crowded. Instead of stocking up on every “promise in a jar,” here are the core ingredients that are actually necessary for the ten most common skin conditions (for example, you should know that there are better solutions than lip balm for those cold-weather chapped lips).

1. Occasional breakouts
Look for a spot treatment with a minimum of 10% sulfur to dry up a pimple in a pinch, advises Jamie Yee, Director of Education at Kate Somerville, a skincare hotspot that tends to the complexions of celebs like Demi Moore and Kate Hudson. Pair this with derma roller amazon and you’re good to go.

2. Dark circles under the eyes
Skincare guru, Liz Earle, notes that dark circles are rarely caused by lack of sleep. Instead, blame fluid retention and nasal congestion, which causes the veins that usually drain from the eyes to your nose to become diluted and darker. To combat, drink plenty of water to fight dehydration and discourage fluid retention. Topically, witch hazel’s astringent properties can help to shrink the capillaries.

4. Dry, flaky skin
Look for hard-working botanical ingredients like shea butter, which is very nourishing, advises Earle. Other ingredients that calm extra-dry skin include borage oil and St. John’s Wort, which heals and sooths the skin.

5. Brown sunspots
Try ingredients like Alpha-Arbutin, licorice root and kojic acid, as well as 2 percent hydroquinone for more stubborn spots, says Yee. Small sunspots can also be treated with a nightly application of rosehip oil mixed with a vitamin E capsule, according to Earle. Kate Somerville uses more aggressive treatment, lasers like Cutera’s IPL or LimeLight to target challenging areas of pigmentation.

6. Fine Lines
Look for makeup and creams that include peptides to stimulate collagen, and light-diffusing pigments. Products that reflect light will minimize the appearance of fine lines, says Yee.

7. Puffy eyes
Products with cucumber extract are the most helpful, along with the application of a cold spoon or cool tea bags (black teas work best because of the caffeine, according to Yee). Earle also advises refrigerating eye cream for 5 minutes before applying to reduce puffiness.

8. Acne
For full-fledged acne, Somerville recommends products that combine AHA and BHA acids, time-release Benzoyl Peroxides, and oil-balancing ingredients like marine extracts. If the acne is severe, the ingredients to reconsider may be in your food. Try ditching refined sugars, yeast, gluten products and dairy. Instead, load up on water, fruits, veggies and non-processed foods. If there are still no results, LED treatments such as Omni-Lux use blue and red light technology to target breakouts, bacteria and oil production.

9. Large pores
Exfoliate with gentle jojoba scrubs then follow with lightweight, non-clogging moisturizer. Look for water-based algae extracts because they aren’t heavy and won’t settle into pores.

10. White spots/reverse pigmentation
Some treatments can lighten the skin to “blend” it so that it will be as light as the white spot but be careful as those treatments are risky thanks to the high percentage of skin-bleaching ingredients. A laser treatment known as Fraxel can also help with some loss of pigmentation caused by acne.

This assignment recently came across my desk, and my head perked up all of a sudden. Anyone who knows me knows that I am a huge fan of music. I can’t get enough of it. I probably spend a good 8 hours a day with a set of headphones on my head (which will be a review for another time…I’m planning on ordering a particular brand of headset, and I’ll give you the inside scoop when they arrive).
Music transforms me. I own thousands of mp3 files (all purchased / obtained legally, thank you – support your local artist), and music is capable of evoking the most amazing range of emotions inside me. So when I saw the chance to review an mp3 player, I jumped at the chance. As it turns out, the mp3 player from Holoplot in question – the X-Mini Happy Speaker – evoked an emotion in me all right. It evoked a sense of incredulity.

I’m not the most fashionable guy. I know that, and I accept it as part of who I am. When I find a t-shirt that I like, I buy a dozen of them, all identical. I like my technology to be solid, clunky, heavy pieces of stuff that I can take apart with a screwdriver and mess with. I barely – barely – survive owning an Apple ipod Nano, which is “artsy” enough (with its sleek design and retarded control wheel) to put me on edge; I only bought the thing because I needed something light to slip into my pocket as I worked out at the gym. But the X-Mini Happy Speaker?

Just look at it, for goodness sakes! Are you kidding me? Who designs this rubbish? Amazon is selling this thing for $80! Eighty bucks! Why don’t you just burn your money and skip the middleman?!

Okay, I’ll review it. But I don’t like it. It looks like it was designed by a mentally deficient chimp. Reluctantly – very, reluctantly – I’ll admit, it does have some positive aspects. I have to give it props for combining an mp3 player and a speaker into one unit. I’ll skip over the fact that the speaker always starts off at the loudest possible volume, or that navigating amongst the mp3s or attempting to organize them is, as far as I can tell, impossible. It starts, and it stops. The actual mp3s are stored on a flash memory card, which fits into either SD or micro SD slots on the device. It also possesses a cable that’s carefully hidden away underneath that you can unravel and hook up to another speaker.

Think about that for a moment. It’s a combination mp3 player and speaker. That’s what it has going for it. You can’t navigate or organize the mp3s, they always start playing as loud as possible, and the sound quality of the speaker is so awful that the designers had to include a cable so that you could, you know, connect the thing to a set of speakers that actually sounds halfway decent. There’s also a headphone jack – more bad news, isn’t this thing supposed to be its own speaker? About the only positive thing I can say about the device is that it collapses down like an accordion into a black, roughly spherical lump of plastic. Perfect for playing a game of rounders, or for smashing walnuts.

Overall:

Functionality: 2 out of 10
Style / looks: 0 out of 10
Chances this will be a hit if American consumers have even one brain cell between them: 0 out of 10.

Don’t waste your money. By all means, buy music, and enjoy it. Just don’t try to be artsy and edgy by popping out this device at a social gathering. You’ll look like an idiot, and I’m beginning to suspect that was the designers secret agenda all along. Fail.

After you have signed up for a free account at http://www.lightcms.com, the first thing you will want to do is login to your new site. When you sign up, you choose the name of your site, and will start off being somethinglikethis.publishpath.com. You can always decide to use a custom domain name whenever you are ready. To login, simply type “/login” at the end of your URL, and enter your user name/password credentials. The user name will be the email address you inserted upon sign up. When it’s time to add another website, don’t create a new account, but add the site through your account settings. This way you can manage all your sites with one login.
Now, it’s time to familiarize yourself with the graphical user interface and the administrative toolbar options. In this article, the goal is to fast-track your learning curve, but for a more in depth understanding of what LightCMS (asp .net cms) has to offer, you will want to set up your free 3 page website. They will provide you with online support sites, and a forum for more advanced users to congregate and share knowledge of the system.

You can always return to your home page administrative view by clicking on “My Website.” Just to the right of this, you will see the “My Account, Help, and Log-out” options. Below that, you will find the buttons “Content, Designs, Users, Settings, Pages, Stats, and Billing.” One more level below those, you will see “Page settings, Preview page, and Add a new page.” These tools are invaluable to you as you focus on the design of your website.

Take a moment to locate the Design Gallery where LightCMS offers over 75 template designs that you can customize and make changes to at no additional cost. This is a remarkable feature because in just a few short minutes, you can literally add new content to your live site right away, or even change the overall design in seconds.

First, click on the “Designs” button. On the next page, click on “Design Gallery” tab and take a look at all the web design templates LightCMS has to offer. Click on any template and from within the pop-up window, you should select “Add to My Designs.” Click “Ok” to continue.

Welcome to the “My Designs” area! This is the section where you will administer changes to the .html and CSS template files, add Google Analytics, or add LightCMS tokens. I’ll mention more about tokens in a moment. Click on a template and select “Apply” to load the design to your site. To enter the Design Manager where you have all the control over the code and style sheets, just click the “Edit” link after selecting a template within your “My Designs” section. All your files will be on the right, and the text editor will be on the left.

If you would rather take some time to design each page before the site is officially published, you will need to access the “Page Settings” of that page, click on the “Advanced” tab, and mark it as “hidden.” This feature allows you to focus on the look and feel of our page prior to it showing up on the main navigation bar. You can easily publish hidden pages by un-checking the hidden option.

To set your default template for the site, click on “Settings” and select a template file from the drop-down menu beneath, “Which template should this website use?” You can also choose this at the “Page Settings” level, but will need to find the “Advanced” tab and select either the “home” or “inside” template. You can always add more template files to choose from by using FTP access to upload your additional template files or custom design templates.

Don’t worry about making any mistakes in the Design Manager area because with LightCMS you can always “select a previous version to load.” Every saved version of your template files are archived, and these save states can be called to revert your template back to a prior state. You can also re-apply the template from the design gallery, or re-upload the custom design if necessary.

Tokens are system specific code blocks that perform special operations within the system. LightCMS.com defines them in the following way.

“Tokens are the key to integrating dynamic content management functionality with your custom website designs. Tokens are small bits of code that our servers replace with dynamic content and functionality when the site is run on our system. The content that each token outputs can often be styled through your CSS files to meet your design objectives.”

Tokens allow for the creation of navigation items, editable content regions, search functionality, breadcrumb trails, login status, page titles, and more. These tokens will be highlighted yellow within the Design Manager Text Editor to help you locate them easily.

LightCMS makes it easy to upload a business logo, and this is likely one of the first steps you will take when you begin branding your website. Click on the “My Account” button on the middle toolbar, and then go to the “Account Settings,” and upload an image of your logo.

Adding a logo to any site is just as easy. Click “Settings,” go to the “Advanced” tab and upload a website logo in seconds.

There are many more features that I just don’t have the time to go into them all. Here are some further links to help you get started with LightCMS. I highly recommend giving this product a test drive. Having the opportunity to help others create and develop web pages has been a great joy for me, but best of all, I’ve been able to bring a deeper understanding of LightCMS to users who need a little guidance. We don’t hold your hand, but rather, we point you to the resources that will make you independently proficient with the product.

“Why can she go golfing in the middle of the work day?” was a common complaint during the summer months. My sales manager’s response to those who complained about my extra perks was very motivational. He always responded, “Because she made her sales for the month, if you make your sales for the month early you also can leave early”.
From that manager, I learned what positive motivation and incentives could achieve with a professional sales force. Management supported his efforts because his team always made their sales quotas early and they were motivated each month to achieve success.

The Sales Management Model

“The worker is not the problem. The problem is at the top! Management!” is a well know saying of Dr. Edward Deming the founder of Japanese business management. Through personal experience, I have found this belief to be true of most sales organizations. I have found that expecting successful sales professionals to continue to produce without continually adding additional incentives or recognitions when they meet sale quotas often leads to high staff turnovers and decreased sales.

A common mistake within most sales management models is the continued increase of sales quotas for successful sales staff without providing the motivation for them to succeed again. I have found that positive incentives and realistic sales increases keep top sales professionals continually motivated to succeed even when sales quotas are increased.

Sales are the lifeblood for any successful business and businesses should treat their most successful sales professionals as cherished employees. Sales professionals, who produce above expectations, are positive examples and require special rewards. This also motivates other sales team members to succeed. In this type of sales model, sales personnel that regularly do not meet quotas stand out and require retraining or termination.

A successful sale management model should always offer special rewards or bonuses to keep these sales professionals happy and continually motivated. Offering creative rewards such as optional end of the month time off or increased commission rates as staff surpasses certain levels of monthly quotas provides an excellent incentive to attract successful sale professionals and to keep them continually motivated.

Develop a Team

Finding sales professionals with excellent records of accomplishment is critical when creating a continuously motivated sales force. In my management of such personnel, I have discovered that hiring these successful professionals requires an active pursuit. Many of these high performance sales professionals are cherished by employers and are not seeking new employment.

Prior to recruiting sales staff, I always develop an outline of my ideal sales person. Hiring factors to consider include prior sales experience, key interpersonal skills to close sales and self-motivators who understand that rewards come with the completion of successful sales quotas.

Experience over College

In my career as a recruiter, I discovered that many human resource departments often eliminate successful sale personnel when college is a key consideration for hire. I prefer to dismiss college experience until all sales requirements are met. Certain businesses do require college educated sales professionals but a successful sale record and experience is always a first consideration.

Zoloft is a miracle drug to some, offering an escape from anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder, depressive disorder, and panic disorder. I have personally been taking Zoloft for ten years. A little longer than the time I have been using my skin care product I bought with the help of vitamin c serum for face reviews.

I am very happy with Zoloft, but Zoloft does have side effects. It is really up to you to determine if these side effects outweigh the benefits of taking Zoloft.
One side effect that I have suffered from since I have been on Zoloft is excessive sweating. I know this is not something that you want to hear, but Zoloft does make you sweat more then you normally do. This is easily countered by dressing in a slightly cooler manner and making sure that you are using enough deodorant. I also recommend that you use baby powder if the sweating is a little out of control.

Another unfortunate side effect is the weight gain. I don’t know what it is about Zoloft, but I gained twenty five pounds since taking Zoloft. Weight gain is never fun, but it can be lessened. I found that by drinking a lot of water I was able to curb the hunger pangs that the Zoloft caused. I also increased my exercises regimen. While I am still up 25 pounds since I began taking Zoloft, I have to say for a 10-year run, that isn’t really that traumatic.

When you first begin taking Zoloft another side effect it causes is nausea. I was fortunate enough to not to experience that side effect. I do know some people who suffered from nausea. The good thing about this was that after a month on the medication the nausea subsided. I would recommend that you keep ginger tablets on hand if you do have this side effect.

I also occasionally suffer from insomnia, another common Zoloft side effect. I typically try to avoid all caffeine after twelve noon, and work hard not to oversleep in the morning if I have had a hard time falling asleep the night before.

Some people complain of suffering from headaches while on Zoloft. I have not had any increase in headaches since being on this medication. I have also never heard any of my friends who are on Zoloft complain of this side effect.